Heretical Fishing 4: A Cozy Guide to Annoying the Cults, Outsmarting the Fish, and Alienating Oneself by Haylock Jobson

Author:Haylock Jobson [Jobson, Haylock]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Podium Publishing
Published: 2025-08-26T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

To Become One

Deep under the sea floor, in a place where only ancient beings dared tread, just such a being forged his way through pillars of petrified wood. That these abyssal depths were once a verdant forest would have sparked curiosity in even the most blasé of souls. But this wasn’t new information to the elemental. He’d been the one to sink it, after all.

If not for the thing he’d left here, he wouldn’t have wasted his time in reexamining this past destruction. If anything, it was a chore to make his way through the material, its crystalline structure annoying to break. But break they did, being scooped into his body, ground down into sediment and . . . Oh? What is this?

One of the former trees he’d collected, a solid column of permineralized wood, was harder than it had any right being. No matter how hard he tried to destroy it, the material didn’t yield. In all his years, so many that entire forests had the time to petrify, he had never encountered such a substance.

Filled with a need to understand this crystal’s composition, he sent all of his awareness within himself, focusing every bit of his will on the single rock. It pooled around it, then in the darkness of his sediment-filled mass, something cracked. A shell surrounding the fossil shattered, revealing a deep purple light.

If the elemental had possessed lungs, the air would have been knocked from them. This object had formed naturally, doing so without the help of a cultivator, yet every part of its crystalline structure was filled with chi.

It was impossible. Such a thing couldn’t exist.

It had been countless millennia since the elemental last learned something new. Myriad empires had risen and fallen, as had entire continents—one of which he was currently digging through the remains of. He boomed a laugh, the sound so loud that it shook the world. The surrounding stone and crystal crumbled, only a single object strong enough to survive the localized earthquake.

Another pillar of petrified wood, its crystals just as chi infused as the one within him. The elemental scooped it up. He applied his will to it once more, and when the same shell disintegrated, purple light shone free. He spread out in search of more. Just how many had formed? He had to contain his desire lest he get carried away and let the newborn elemental sense his work. But though he limited his essence expenditure, he was detected.

An ancient power came from below, rage and despair fueling its passage.

But he knew her well. Instead of fleeing or preparing a defense, he invited her to join him—to become one once more. Sitting atop the porous stone previously separating them, she froze, her indignation making way for a question.

He was all too happy to answer, and he let his memories flow out. He’d had to leave her here when they destroyed the continent. He hadn’t abandoned her. He, too, had locked himself in the same stasis. Spreading

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